Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 23.djvu/594

Rh and is a fine and safe port. In the town there are two cathedrals (the Roman Catholic and the Anglican), and outside it a botanical garden. San Fernando, about 30 miles southward, with a population of 7000, is an important shipping place.

Of the total area about 300,000 acres are cultivated. The principal productions of the island are sugar and cocoa; coffee is also becoming important. Trinidad has suffered much from the effect of foreign state bounties, especially the export premiums of Germany and France. The sugar production in 1871 was 53,000 tons, in 1881 44,000 tons, and in 1885 64,000 tons. The principal exports in 1885 were sugar, 64,000 tons (value 684,675); rum, 72,525 galls. (7878); molasses, 2,416,761 galls. (45,835); cocoa, 14,904,840 Ibs. (421,974); coffee, 20,270 Ibs.; asphalt, 28,505 tons raw and 6731 tons boiled; cocoa-nuts, 9,645,700; bitters (Angostura and others) and liquors, 32,240 galls.; the total value was 2,246,664, including 707,421 specie and bullion. The imports in 1885 (including bullion and specie) were 2,241,478. Among the principal items are cottons, linens, woollens, and textiles generally (largely from the United Kingdom), 235,895; fish, flour, and provisions (principally from the United States), 270,000; lumber (from Canada), 43,075; rice (half from India), 113,940; hardware and machinery (principally from the United Kingdom), 116,894; gold (principally from Venezuela in transit), 651,398. The sailing vessels entering Trinidad ports in 1885 had a burden of 150,219 tons, the steamers a burden of 385,950 tons. The total public revenue in 1885 was 429,307, of which 240,444 was for customs and excise. The total expenditure was 443,920. There are 145 public schools, of which 61 are Government and 61 assisted, Avith a total attendance of 13,282 scholars. The principal towns are connected by railway lines.

Trinidad was discovered by Columbus on 31st July 1496. It remained in Spanish possession (although its principal town, San Jose de Oruna, was burnt by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1595) until 1797, when a British expedition from Martinique caused its capitulation, and it was finally ceded to Great Britain in 1802 by the treaty of Amiens. Its real starting-point as a productive country was in 1781, when the Madrid Government began to attract foreign immigrants. Trinidad is still strictly a crown colony of Great Britain. The legislative council includes the governor as president, and six official and eight unofficial members, all appointed by the crown. During the labour crisis caused by emancipation and the subsequent equalization of the British duties on free and slave-grown sugar, the colony was greatly assisted by the skilful administration of Lord Harris, governor from 1846 to 1851.

See De Verteuil, Trinidad; Colonial Office List; Guppy, Trinidad Almanac; and Government Geological Survey.

       TRIPOLI, a North African state, bounded by the Mediterranean on the north, by the desert of Barca (or Libyan Desert), which separates it from Egypt, on the east, by the Sahara and Fezzan on the south-east, south, and south west, and by Tunis on the north-west. The country is made up of a strip of fertile soil adjacent to the sea, with vast sandy plains and parallel chains of rocky moun tains, which finally join the Atlas range near Kairwan in Tunis. It is naturally divided into five parts, viz., Tripoli proper, to the north-east of which is the plateau of Barca and Jebel al-Akhdar, to the south the oasis of Fezzan, to the south-east that of Aujala, and to the south-west that of Ghadames. It is very badly watered: the rivers are|1}}